[Source: Amsterdam weekly, De Groene Amsterdammer, Feb 22]
March 2 (EIRNS)--DUTCH WEEKLY TARGETS WEAPONS OF MASS
DISINFORMATION; POINTS FINGER AT SMALL GROUP OF REPUBLICANS. The
Dutch weekly, {De Groene Amsterdammer}, which has often attacked
the World Wildlife Fund, asks that, if in spite of the American
propaganda machine's being better oiled than ever,... George Bush
[might not be] losing the battle for the hearts and minds of the
people? ...The following is an EIR translation--all quotes
direct, except what is in square brackets:
"[For example, the] Dutch Ambassador in Washington,
Boudewijn van Eenennaam, complains about the "monopoly of power"
and the "arrogance" of his American discussion partners. This is
the first time such words come out of the mouth of a Dutch
Ambassador. ... for the first time since September 11, 2001 the
American propaganda machine is not working. ... After the
terrorist attacks, the White House contracted the most important
brand manager from the American advertising world, Charlotte
Beers, for the task of selling brand USA to the rest of the
world. The information war around the American bombardment of
Aghanistan was taken on. Under the auspices of Blair's favorite
spin doctor, Alistair Campbell, three Coalition Information
Centers were set up in Washington, London, and Islamabad. ... the
initiatives were concentrated in the Office of Global
Communications in the White House under the leadership of
Charlotte Beers herself, whose strategy is in tune with the
Pentagon. ...
"The job of the former Office of Strategic Influence, which
was to plant disinformation from the Pentagon in the foreign and
domestic media, was outsourced to the public relations firm, The
Rendon Group. Director John Rendon, who walks around in battle
dress in his spare time, and plays with toy soldiers in sand
boxes, ... did the PR in 1989 against Manuel Noriega, in 1990 for
the Emir of Kuwait, and later for the Iraqi National Congress.
At this time, Rendon provides, for a fee of a hundred thousand
dollars a month, "tainted" information, "exclusive reports" and
talk show guests to Rupert Murdoch's papers, among others, and
Fox News, which have been solidly behind Bush since September 11,
2001.
"'Vietnam also began with a lie,' said actor Dustin Hoffman
last week at a film festival in Berlin. We don't have to go that
far back. The last Gulf War began with 'the mother of all lies,'
put out into the world by the PR firm, Hill & Knowlton (H&K).
Within two weeks of Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, the Republican
right wing had formed a committee, Citizens for a Free Kuwait
(CFK) . . . via the CFK tens of PR firms were hired, including
Rendon and H&K, to call for the "liberation" of Kuwait. H&K spent
more than ten million dollars on press conferences and other
media events, the production of horror videos about Saddam's
regime, the printing of 'Free Kuwait'-T-shirts or bumper
stickers, and influencing members of Congress. The high point of
the campaign was a hearing in the Human Rights Chamber of the
Congress, where tens of witnesses, trained by H&K, were pushed
forward as Kuwaiti "witnesses" and told how Saddam's troops
misbehaved in their country. The crown witness was the 15-year
old Nayirah, who maintained that with her own eyes she had seen
Iraqi soldiers in a hospital in Kuwait City, throw hundreds of
babies out of their cribs to die on the bare floor. This story
turned out to be made up. Nayirah, who was later revealed to be
the daughter of the Kuwait ambassador to the US, had never seen
the inside of the hospital. According to insiders, this material
got Bush senior enough Congressional votes to be able to declare
war on Iraq. When the truth came to light, the ground war was
already over...
"There are only about fifteen Republicans who are shaping
American policy in the Middle East. These are the same who since
the 1980s have been aiming for American control of all the
strategic materials in the world. In 1990 these were the ones who
set up Citizens for a Free Kuwait, in 1999 the Balkan Action
Committee for the `liberation' of Kosovo. Today they are pooling
their strength in the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, in
which, once again, all the lines come together: fundamentalist
Christians, conservative opinion makers and (ex-) government
advisers, such as Perle, Kristol and Scheunemann, representatives
of the Iraqi oppositions, PR-personnel, former intelligence
officers...."

ASIA

[source: New York Times, by Sean Naylor, March 2]
THE LESSONS OF OPERATION ANACONDA: THE LIMITS OF
TECHNOLOGICAL SUPERIORITY. An op-ed by Sean Naylor, a writer for
{Army Times}, points out that last year's Operation Anaconda in
Afghanistan's Shah-i-kot Valley "should serve as a cautionary
tale for Americans convinced that our technological superiority
is a foolproof defense against the element of surprise."
Naylor notes that this was the only significant combat
operation being conducted at the time by U.S. troops anywhere in
the world, and that commanders had assured their troops that
"every national asset" -- satellites, spy planes, Predator drones
-- were focused on the Shah-i-kot Valley, and yet, "despite these
high-tech systems, the intelligence estimate failed to accurately
portray the enemy's size, location, principal weapons and course of action."

[source: New York Times, March 2]

ANOTHER LESSON FROM THE AFGHANISTAN `SUCCESS.' A caption
under a photo of a malnourished Afghan child in today's New York
Times, reports: "In Kabul, the number of children suffering
malnutrition has increased from 6% in 2001, to 11% in 2002.